The Camera Never Lies
by kasey8473
Summary: While checking up on what the Ghostfacers are bumbling with lately, Sam discovers an amusing video posted to their site that stars Jo Harvelle.


* * *

Title: The Camera Never Lies  
Summary: While checking up on what the Ghostfacers are bumbling with lately, Sam discovers an amusing video posted to their site that stars Jo Harvelle.  
Rating: K+  
Disclaimer: Supernatural was created by Eric Kripke. No disrespect is intended.  
Notes: Lines from movies have been credited in-text to the movies they came from.

* * *

It was sort of a morbid fascination thing, Sam decided, clicking the link to go to the Ghostfacers site. Periodically, he liked to check out their site and see what they'd stumbled into, if anything. Sometimes, they even had extra video content up that he could laugh through. Humor was greatly appreciated whenever he could find it these days.

Little was changed, he saw, except there were two new videos. The first didn't interest him, but the second was titled 'Beauty and the Beast Ghost'. Sam clicked on it, then paused it to let it load. The video appeared to be a long one. Excellent. He enjoyed the longer ones best, as it showed Harry and Ed's ineptitude to great advantage.

* * *

_Ed Zeddmore appeared first. He was sitting in an overstuffed chair, wearing a ridiculous smoking jacket. "Harry and I went solo for our last case. Sadly, Maggie and Spruce were unable to join us. It was an exploratory mission, but this case was a real treat, I have to say. Why? Because it brought us into contact with a fellow Ghostfacer, a young, nubile, beautiful woman on a mission. It was obvious we'd inspired her to face ghosts all on her own. Our first meeting was filled with her fiery passion for and unswerving dedication to Ghostfacing."_

_He was replaced by grainy footage that clearly showed that Spruce was the one with the camera talent. _

* * *

Sam squinted at the screen.

* * *

_There was the click of a gun being cocked and a familiar voice sounded only seconds before that voice had form._

_Jo Harvelle._

* * *

Sam paused the video and unplugged his earbuds. "Hey Dean, come here. You're going to want to see this." He turned up the volume and set the earbuds aside.

"New porn site? Is it a good one?" He got up from one bed and came over, dragging the second chair around so he could see the screen. "Ghostfacers? Dude, didn't you get enough of them last time?"

"Shut up and watch. This is gonna be good. I can tell." Sam restarted it so Dean could see the beginning.

* * *

"_Start talking or I put holes in your asses." She had the gun aimed at them and looked good for the circumstances. Her hair was tucked behind her ears and even with the bad video, Sam could see she had some confidence in her stance and attitude. Her eyes had that no-nonsense stare Ellen liked to use to intimidate. _

* * *

Sam smiled a little. Like mother, like daughter. Put the two side by side and there was no denying that Jo was Ellen's daughter.

* * *

"_That thing loaded," Harry's voice asked._

_Jo touched her tongue to her upper lip, brows drawn together in a disbelieving frown. Sam half expected her to say, 'you've got to be kidding me', but her reply was to the point. "Yeah. Yeah it is. Talk."_

"_I'm Ed Zeddmore and this is Harry Spengler --"_

"_Great. Ed and Harry. What the *bleep* are you doing here?"_

"_What are **you** doing here," Ed countered._

_Jo blinked once. "Redecorating. What does it look like I'm doing?"_

_The camera jerked to Ed and back to Jo. The brief glimpse of Ed revealed he had a knowing smirk on his lips. "It looks like **you're** hunting ghosts."_

_Her bows rose and she lowered the gun. "How observant. What are you doing here," she repeated._

"_We're Ghostfacers." He said it in such a way that Sam could just picture him holding his hands up and spreading them apart as he spoke the two words. Just to emphasize them. Or maybe doing that other stupid arm movement._

_Her lips pursed to one side. Sam could see her thinking fast, probably trying to decide if they were something she should watch out for -- which they were. They'd get her killed if she **didn't** watch them. "Of course you are. I'm Jo. Jo Harvelle."_

_The footage cut back to Ed in the chair. "As you can see, Jo had passion --"_

"_Beauty," Harry added, waggling a finger at the viewer._

"_A nice ass…" _

"_I didn't look at her ass."_

"_I did. It was nice. Trust me. She had all that --"_

"_And maybe some anger issues," Harry added. "Because, you know, the…uh… whole gun thing…yeah. Moving on."_

_In-the-field video once more._

"_You wanna get that camera out of my face before I smash it?" She turned, head cocked as she started across the dark room._

She was trying to listen for any sounds elsewhere on the property. He knew just how frustrating those two could be. Something was edited out because Sam noticed Jo had put the gun away and now held a flashlight. He wondered just what had been edited.

"That's my girl," Dean commented. "Give 'em hell, Jo. They deserve it, stupid bastards."

* * *

"_We're documenting."_

_Jo raised one hand, displaying the classic 'screw you' gesture, only half blurred out. "Document this."_

"_Documented for posterity. So, Jo," Ed caught up with her, Harry still invisible and filming behind them. "How long have you been one of us?"_

"_One of you." Her laugh had little humor in it. "Right. Yeah. I've been at this awhile."_

"_You always work alone?" Harry's voice, the camera panning up and down Jo. Sam could see she had a messenger bag slung across her body, the flap open. "Isn't that dangerous? Being a woman and all." The camera zoomed onto her breasts then zoomed back out._

* * *

"_Are you saying I can't do this because I'm a **woman**?" More than a little ice in her tone. She'd gone a few rounds on that issue before, Sam knew._

* * *

Dean 'tsked'. "She let him keep his testicles for that one? I'm disappointed."

* * *

"_Not at all. Ghostfacers welcome all sexes --"_

"_There's more than two? How did I not know that," she quipped. _

_The camera lowered to a nice view of their feet, Harry chiming in. "What Ed means is that we have no discrimination against anyone wanting to be a Ghostfacer. All color, race, creed is welcome." The camera raised. For several seconds, Jo was out of focus._

"_It's something anyone can do."_

"_Sure." Jo nodded her head, then rolled her eyes._

"_Back to my question. Do you work alone?"_

_A heavy sigh left her and she turned back to face the camera. "Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. My first real job I had friends with me and it was a good thing. That job was a tough one and at the time, I didn't have the skills I really needed. I learned a lot from them." She licked her lips. "Look, Ed. Harry. Not to be a bitch or anything, but could you two shut the *bleep* up for two seconds?"_

_The screen went blank, though Ed and Harry's voices continued in whispers._

"_What do you think, Ed?"_

"_I think she's cute. Like a Ghostfacers Barbie doll, only live and breathing. She's so little and petite."_

* * *

Sam snickered. Jo? A Barbie? Yeah, she'd take that well.

"That live Barbie can hit," Dean remarked. "It took forever to see again out that one eye."

* * *

"_A little tense. Wonder why? This isn't a big haunting. I checked. I did a whole hour of research this time."_

* * *

Yeah, Sam thought. Because one hour usually gets you everything you need to know.

Sometimes Sam spent days researching on a job and still didn't know everything they needed to know.

"Well, I guess they learned something from us after all. An hour of research. Damn. After all we went through. You'd think they would've improved by now."

"I don't think that. Why would you think that?"

Dean settled back in his chair. "This needs popcorn. We got any?"

"No. You ate the last of it yesterday."

"And you didn't buy more?"

* * *

"_Uh-huh. She's hot, Harry. Smoking hot. You see how she was looking at me? I think she digs me, right?"_

"_Hey," came Jo's voice. "Jerk-offs. I can still hear you. Zip it."_

_The picture appeared again as Ed hurried forward. "Sorry,…Jo, was it?"_

"_You got it."_

"_This'll help. Here. You can use this." With the manner of a man trying to impress a woman with his know-how, Ed handed Jo a small device._

_Jo took the device, looked at it. Her glance flicked up to him and back to the device. "What's this?"_

"_This is a handy little device that every Ghostfacer should have in his or her personal arsenal. It's an EMF meter. You see, you use it to scan --"_

_Jo's look of disdain would have wounded a more observant man. "For nothing. There's live wires outside. It won't pick up shit with live wires around." She shoved it back at him. "Put it away. We've got to do this the old-fashioned way."_

"_The old-fashioned way," Harry repeated._

"_We listen, which is why I wanted you two amateur idiots to shut-up."_

"_I'll have you know we're professionals, Jo. We might have a tv show and everything."_

"_That's Special Ed. Really." Jo turned her back to the camera, heading down a long, dark hallway. Ed kept his flashlight trained on her rear._

* * *

Dean laughed. "Special Ed." He shook his head. "Jo made a funny and they don't even get it."

"Not everyone can appreciate humor like you do, Dean."

"Don't I know it."

* * *

"_We'd have it already if it weren't for those **Winchester** dicks."_

_Jo stopped so suddenly that Ed walked right into her, making her stumble against the wall. "Winchester dicks," she asked, turning her head just a little. _

"_A couple of self-righteous douchebags named Sam and Dean," Ed clarified. _

"_Complete assholes nosing in on our cases," Harry very helpfully supplied._

"_When did you run into these…Winchester guys?" Jo swung her flashlight beam back and forth across the ceiling._

"_Awhile back. We had some awesome footage and those dicks brought a magnet into our work area, erasing everything."_

_Jo made an odd snorting sound, like she was trying to cover up laughter. "That's a tragedy."_

"_Tell me about it," Ed said. "They suck." He continued for a few minutes on that subject, elaborating on it, with Harry backing him up, until…._

_The gun went off. Sam hadn't even noticed Jo taking it back out._

"_You shot at me!" Ed was up against the wall._

* * *

Dean laughed.

* * *

_The screen showed ceiling, wall, ceiling, floor, and finally settled back on Jo. She was smirking just a fraction._

"_I thought I saw something. Good thing I mostly missed you, huh? Sorry about that, Ed. I know rock salt hurts." Tilting her head a little, Jo batted her eyelashes at him._

"_Um…that's okay."_

_They resumed their discussion, or rather Ed and Harry's discussion on the many ways Sam and Dean sucked, when the gun went off again. This time it was Harry who cried out._

_Jo's smirk remained fixed. "Was I the only one who saw that?"_

"_You saw something?" Ed peered at the camera. He was probably peering at the hallway behind Harry in reality._

"_Oh yeah," Jo agreed. "Sure did. Lotta pissy activity going on here."_

"_Harry, are you getting anything on camera?"_

"_That's a big no, Ed."_

"_Are you sure you saw something, Jo?"_

"_Positive." She resumed her path along the hall to the stairs. "Since I can't get you to shut up…. What do you know about this place?"_

"_What do **you** know?"_

"_I know that I could shoot you for real if you piss me off and sleep really well tonight after."_

"_Fair enough." Ed fell into step beside her. "The original owner -- Michael Marsden -- was a scarred, merchant and captain whose enemies called him the 'Beast Captain'. He built this house for his bride, a young heiress, and no sooner had they moved in than she died. Rumor said he killed her. He married two more times and both times the women died strange deaths."_

"_Eerie deaths." Harry turned the camera around so an extreme close-up of his face was on the screen. "Some would say…mysterious deaths." There was a dizzying whirl of hallway for several long seconds before Jo and Ed were in the picture._

"_He haunts the house. The Beast Ghost, he's now called."_

"_Of course he does." Jo opened the door on her left, glanced in the room. Sam had the impression she was both bored and aggravated._

"_There've been two disappearances in the past six months. I looked at missing person's reports." Harry's pride reflected in his voice and Jo promptly deflated it._

"_There've been more than that. Fifteen going back a hundred years." The picture zoomed to just her head._

"_You went back that far?"_

_Jo frowned a fierce frown of annoyance mixed with disgust. "Ed, are you touching me? You'd better not be touching me."_

"_It's just my hand."_

"_I should hope it's just your hand and not some other body part. Remove it."_

_A sickening fast zoom out._

_Ed raised his hands out on either side of him. "I'm only being friendly."_

"_Stop it or I'll make you."_

* * *

"Looks like someone's getting a crush on Jo," Sam remarked. He wondered just what was attracting Ed to Jo. Her confidence? Her pretty face? Her rear? Personally, he liked the whole package.

"She makes him feel funny, like when he used to climb the rope in gym class."

Sam rolled his eyes. 'Wayne's World' had been on the tv the previous night so of course Dean would have it fresh in his memory.

* * *

_They walked along the hallway, opening doors and looking in rooms in silence. There were no signs of any activity aside from their own. As they walked, Ed waved his hands at Harry, signaling him to hang back._

"_So, Jo…. Do you think the two of us could, maybe, sometime…." Ed sidled up against her. "You got a boyfriend?"_

_She shrugged his hand off her shoulder. "Yes, two big ones, and they lust wimp blood so quit bugging me or I'll sic them all over your weenie ass."_

* * *

Dean nodded. "Sixteen Candles. Wasn't the line 'three big ones', though?"

Sam shrugged. "You tell me. I don't have the entire movie committed to memory like you do."

* * *

_Ed couldn't take a hint, subtle or blatant. It appeared that something was cut out again, for they were now in a different hallway. He continued to pester Jo until she made a noise of frustration and stomped forward, whirling to face him and --_

_Disappeared from view with a scream and crash. _

* * *

"Oh shit! Sam leaned forward. A futile gesture, he knew, as he could hardly materialize there and help her. "Jo!"

"If they got her killed and are crassly attempting to profit from her death in some way, I'm gonna kill them. Slowly."

* * *

_Ed and Harry sat with contemplative poses, Ed asking, "Did we panic?"_

"_No, we did not."_

_Back to the in-field video. Ed and Harry screamed, going to where Jo had stomped, showing that the floor had given way and she was still there, hanging on to rotting boards that were making an ominous creaking noise._

"_Hang on! We'll help you!" They reached for her and were too late as she dropped to the main floor below._

* * *

"That look to you like she fell just then?" Dean glanced at him.

Sam looked back. "Hell no. Looked to me like she let go rather than let them pull her up."

* * *

_The video lurched in wild circles as the two hurried back along the hall and down the stairs, calling Jo's name all the while. By the time they got downstairs, Jo was heading for the front door, her low muttering not audible enough to decipher, though Sam could figure it out easily enough. She was limping slightly._

"_Jo? Where are you going?"_

"_Yeah." Harry shook the camera. "Don't you want to finish?"_

"_There's nothing here," she opened the trunk of her car._

_The video cut out, replaced by Ed and Harry. "How right she was! This house was a bust. We found no evidence that the Beast Ghost actually existed."_ _Ed turned somber, fingers steepled before him. "But as for our feller 'facer…. Jo has beauty, brains. She has it all and what can I say? We clicked. It was a meeting of like minds. It's a beautiful thing." He sniffed, wiped an imaginary tear from his eye. _

* * *

"A meeting of the minds?" Dean shook his head. "It's more like Jo and the Two Stooges."

* * *

_A clip began, seconds long._

"_Touch me again, Ed, and you're gonna lose that hand." Reaching out, she grabbed his hand, gripping his index and middle finger, bending them back. "Do I make myself very *bleep*ing clear?"_

"_Yes, yes, yes!"_

_Back to Ed, who was making a 'pensive' expression. "We had a connection, Jo and I. Love maybe? Who can tell for sure. This road we walk as Ghostfacers is a long, lonely, solitary one --"_

"_Except for having each other," Harry interrupted. "And Maggie and Spruce."_

"_--not so solitary one. I had to leave her behind."_

_Another clip of Jo, first tossing things in the trunk of a car with the force of a woman majorly pissed off -- man, she looked just like Ellen right there--, then whirling, jabbing a finger at Ed and the camera._

"_If I ever see you two jerk-off, amateur, mother *bleep*ing *bleep* again --"_

_The video cut off, abruptly returning to Ed and Harry. They were standing now, with two champagne flutes in hand. The bubbly liquid was probably ginger ale._

"_Jo Harvelle, we salute you. Ghostfacer of the week!"_

_A screencap of Jo ended the video, the only one of her not smirking, grimacing, rolling her eyes, or snarling in the entire video._

* * *

Dean looked at him with a grin. "I am so buying Jo shots the next time we see her." He pointed a finger at the screen. "_That_ was awesome!"

"She did all right by herself."

"Except for those two interrupting her hunt."

"Think she went back?"

"Once she was sure they were gone."

"Think she'll see their video of her?"

Dean laughed. "God I hope so! They'll lose more than their hard drives and video content if she does. Can you download that or something, Sammie? That's a keeper."

Sam nodded. "I'll see what I can do."

Halfway back to the bed, Dean stopped, looking over his shoulder. "I'm glad she's okay."

"Me too." After some finagling, Sam had a copy of the video saved to the hard drive and good thing too. It was gone when he looked the next day, as though it had never existed at all.

* * *


End file.
